English Grammar—The Past Perfect Tense

hi welcome to right to top I'm Adam in today's video we're gonna look at the past perfect tense okay this is a everyday very commonly used tense and for some reason people just find it to be a very tricky tense weather in reading and especially when it comes to writing okay I know that all of you have studied this pretty early on in your ASL education but many people still find it tricky so we're gonna look at it and make sure we know how to use it when to use it when we don't have to use it etc and look at some examples okay so we're gonna start by the basics how do you put together a past perfect tense well very simple very straightforward you have your head helping verb auxiliary verb plus your past participle verb so for example eat simple past eight past participle eaten right so the third verb had eaten so Tom had offered to help but Jim refused so before Jim refused Tom had offered to help or in the past so everything is happening in the past basically what you need to remember about the past perfect and this is the most important element of this tense is that you're always showing a sequence or you're showing a chronological relationship a relationship based on time and order of time and about things that happened in the past okay it has to be between at least two or more actions situations events in the past so everything happened in the past you're gonna have one simple past verb you have to have one simple past because that is the verb that's used to basically reference the time or be an anchor or show you everything is in relation to this and then you're gonna see what happened before this what happened after this okay so you have a an anchor point you have a point that we is definitely we know when it happened then you're gonna have another action or another situation that happened before the first action so when you go before and you're going bit further back in time you're gonna use the past perfect when you start going forward again still in the past but ahead of the first one then you going simple past so for example when I arrived home so I arrived home simple past this is my time frame my reference point when I arrived home the pizza I had ordered means I ordered it before I came home I at the office I called the pizza place I said send me a pizza and then I left my office I arrived home the pizza that I called for before that I had ordered before arrived I arrived home the pizza arrived ok then when I went to eat it my roommate asked if he could have a piece even though so he asked for a piece even though he had eaten before right so is that if I'm going forward but in the past simple past if I'm going backwards I'm going to the past perfect now let me make this a little bit easier for you let's look at a graph ok you have the basically the time situation so you have your present time and when we're looking at the past perfect everything is in the past and it's always going to be at least two situations so I have the red bar will represent the past perfect the blue bar will represent the simple past ok so let's look at that same sentence when I got home simple past the pizza I had ordered I ordered it before I arrived after I got home so arrived home had ordered arrived ok my roommate asked so I arrived the pizza arrived my roommate asked so I'm going forward in time simple past simple past simple past if he could have some of it some of the pizza even though he had already had his dinner he had his dinner before I sat down with my pizza so now I'm going backwards again ok forward simple past backward past perfect that's essentially how you're gonna use the past perfect ok if you're going backward in time in relation to another action pass perfect if you're going forward in relation to that action but still in the past simple past of course there are some situations where you're going to use this simple present as well or the past perfect but I'll explain those as we go so going backward past perfect going forward simple past now let's look at a few examples the earthquake occurred last Monday last Monday we have my the time expression we know exactly when and we have a simple past verb it happened at this time done there was much destruction and many people lost their homes and businesses again I'm going forward earthquake destruction lost homes scientists had not been able to predict this disaster so before the earthquake scientists couldn't predict it earthquake before it they couldn't predict it which was why no one was prepared when it came okay and then I'm going forward again simple past based on the results of the market research now another thing about the past perfect remember it's a tool it's gonna put things in order for you but you still have to pay attention to what else is going on in the sentence based on the results of the market research they had commissioned the company decided to raise the price of their new smart phone line so before they raised the price before they made this decision so they decided before that they had commissioned market research okay basically what is their decision based on the market research which was done before they made the decision they had been worried so before the market research before they commissioned it they had been worried about losing market share but when they received the report they were pleased to discover that customers did not mind the new policies given the promised quality of the new phones now did not mind is basically reported speech so here's the report or customers don't mind but I'm telling you what happened in the situation when you have a reported speech you go one tense back and I'll explain that in a moment as well as separately John hadn't even considered a career in marketing until his uncle's partner offered him a position in his Hong Kong office so his uncle's partner for him a position before that he hadn't even considered a career in marketing as his dream had always been to travel the world this opportunity was not one he could pass up so here's the opportunity his dream before this day had always been to travel here's his opportunity he couldn't pass it up he took the job in Hong Kong okay okay let's go on now the reason I'm giving you all these situations where you have to understand exactly what's going on you have to a little bit read between the lines read between the verbs is because for those of you taking a test IELTS TOEFL ace CAE whatever you're gonna have readings and they're gonna test you on your knowledge or on your ability to recognize a chronology based on their verbs used in the reading right so for example many students only find out in their first year of college that certain high school courses they hadn't paid much attention to are actually critical to their academic success so the question is many students are not properly prepared for college true or false well this is true why because in high school they didn't pay attention to certain courses that they need in college right so they only find out in the first year of college so that courses they hadn't paid much attention attention to before coming to college or in high school are actually critical to their academic success now I could say high school is the pastime but again it's all in relation to their first year they find out in their first year that certain high school courses of courses they had had in high school they didn't pay attention to okay so that's the thing you have to understand the relationships and basically the general meaning of the sentence let's look back at the example I gave you before when I got home the pizza I had ordered arrived my roommate asked if he could have some of it even though he had already had his dinner so the question is or the statement is my roommate was hungry true or false well this is a little bit tricky you're thinking well he wants to eat so he must be hungry but no before the pizza came or before I started to eat my pizza he had already had his dinner means he's not hungry he's just you know greedy or he likes pizza he's just wanted to eat some anyway so he's not hungry so the room my roommate was hungry false he had had his dinner he's not hungry he just wants to have a pizza as a snack for him okay cuz pizza you can always have doesn't matter how fool you are I know for me anyway so let's look at a few other things now when we want to add an adverb into the situation right I had plus adverb plus past participle so you put it between the helping verb had and the main verb in the past participle I had not been informed so not is the adverb I had already been informed okay so you put it between when you're making a question you have the helping verb first your subject in the middle your main verb had he received the memo now here are a couple other situations where we use the past perfect to talk about an unrealistic past conditional if subject had past participle verb subject would have past participle verb if I had known you were coming I'd have baked a cake now the reason we use had known how would have baked is because all this is in the past you can't change the past so it's basically unrealistic if I had known but I didn't know so I didn't bake a cake okay so putting the whole thing is a hypothetical situation if I had known now I mentioned before the indirect or the reported speech so remember when you're reporting what someone else said or when you when you're giving a report on what a survey found out or a research found out you're basically reporting it so you're going one tense back so Fred told me so Fred came to me and he Fred said I studied philosophy before switching to marketing so now I go to somebody else and I say Fred told me and when I'm reporting what someone else said or what somewhat other research concluded I'm always going to go one tense back from what they used Fred told me he had studied philosophy Fred said to me I studied I'm telling to somebody else he had studied so one test back so if you go if someone says something in the present tense you go to the past if someone says something in the past tense you go to the past perfect okay I will create a different different lesson a different video lesson for this particular aspect of grammar anyway but just so you know that's what are the use of the past perfect now here you have a situation do you use perfect past perfect or simple past tense when you have time adverbs using wind the thing you have to understand the the clause of when the adverb clause using when will take the simple past and also remember that this clause this adverb clause of time can also be the time marker so I had an example before last Monday so when when I started work this week right so you can have the same idea when as a time expression she had just put down the phone when a truck pulled into her Lane in front of her so here's the truck just before the truck came she had put down her phone right so almost at the same time the win will take the simple past the action that happened just before it will take the past perfect the client had left when I arrived at the office so I arrived before I arrived the clients had left okay if I said the client left when I arrived means I arrived and then the client left so remember if you're going back in time past perfect if you're going forward in time simple past Jennifer's father bought her a car as a graduation gift he promised to do so when she started college or he had promised to do so when she started college both are okay in this case when she started college this is a time expression I'm pointing to the particular time in the past the definite past time and I'm saying what happened at this past time so started college and promised happened at the same time or you could say he had promised in relation to but so he bought her the car when she graduated before he the car he had promised to do so so again depends which one you want to relate to both could be okay both will essentially mean the same thing so it's up to you whether to use it or not if you prefer not to use the past perfect when you don't have to don't but again for those of you taking IELTS or TOEFL you want to use this tense whenever you can you want to show them your ability to use different tenses in different situations okay so that's a good thing to do now when you have adverbs time adverb clauses using before after as soon as by the time etc these particular expressions already create the relationship of wit of sequence of chronology so in this case you don't need to use the past perfect you can if you want you before they graduated each student had to submit a final paper or had had to submit a final paper both okay the before already tells you the relationship of the two of graduated and submit so the before tells you which came first which came second the past perfect not necessary by the time by the time means that the time and then before this time basically I'll do a different lesson on by the time and until by the time prices rose to a sustained to sustainable levels many companies had already gone bankrupt many companies already went bankrupt before that the prices rose so by the time prices rose something had already happened something already happened so before by the time as soon as already established a relationship you don't need the past perfect to do it for you other time indicators the leaders agree to meet again even though their previous meeting had ended badly even though their previous meeting ended badly previous means the one that happened before so again I don't need to use the past perfect I already know the relationship of the two different meetings we had owned that building for fifty years we owned that building for fifty years when you say owns that building for fifty years it's understood that you don't own it anymore but to be clear we had something that happened over a long time and came to an end in the past if you're making a the situation relative to the present or the future I had wanted to go back to school but it looks like I'll have to let that idea go now so here I'm using the past perfect with a simple present what is understood I had wanted to go back to school before I got this job offer but it looks like I'll have to let that idea go now that idea means going back to school this is what I had thought until something happened to make me change my mind okay so that's the key here you've changed your mind based on something that has recently happened that's obvious or doesn't need to be mentioned and then you go on with present situation or future situation etc now for some reason and I'm I'm sometimes I'm not sure why it is but I know that it happens a lot and it happens to native English speakers as well had had people have a very difficult time with had hat but you need to remember that have the verb to have has many uses so when you have had had you still have your first hat is just the helping verb of the past perfect and your second hat is just the past participle of half-right still have if you you have to do something or possession or availability or I have a test next week or situation it's just regular use of the have and is you're putting into the past participle Lynne had had many friends but since she married Larry many of them have deserted her so she married Larry before this marriage she had had okay let me put it another way Lynn has married has many friends okay path you understand she has many friends now I'm going looking everything in the past she had many friends okay but now I'm saying that when did she lose all his friends when she got married before she got married she had had many friends and the same thing applies to any situation with had had helping verb had past participle main verb of 1/2 okay very straightforward try not to let it confuse you just practice with it a little bit it will come to you and that's basically it okay so I hope that was a little bit clearer and I hope you can use your pass perfect a little bit better now remember it's a tool it's there to help you show chronology to help the reader understand what happened first what happened second what's the relationship between events actions situations etc if you're doing the IELTS TOEFL CAE or any of these English tests try to use the past perfect in your writing especially in your speaking if you can as well it'll give you some extra points okay if you have any questions about any of this please ask in my youtube comment section and I'll get to you at some point and if you like this video please give me a like if you liked it a lot please subscribe to my channel I'll have lots of other videos on grammar writing test preparation all kinds of other good stuff okay see you again soon

Channel: Write to the Top

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Keywords: IELTS, English writing, English, writing, language test, English test, IELTS academic essay, grammar, structure, TOEFL independent task, independent essay, how to write, essay writing, tenses, usage, skills, test preparation, pass the IELTS, IELTS high score, TOEFL high score, pass TOEFL, language skills, how to use, better writing, writing skills, how to write in English, IELTS high band, English grammar, IELTS writing, TOEFL writing, past perfect tense

Id: qavSH7RIGLg

Length: 18min 50sec (1130 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 15 2017